Agora Gardens - 亚太

This is home for my first days of Taipei.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8062670@N07/sets/72157601095763717/

Lessons - Day 1 Taiwan
1. Most banks do not accept SGP$. We aren't world currency just yet. Oh well, at least the money launderers are leaving us alone for now. And, the exchange rate is better here too. Ka-chng!

2. People around me are very nice - from my new colleagues, to Ashley (CPC-MDM) are really helpful and warm. I am so very blessed.

3. I actually miss people from home already. Whine! Hard cores - you guys are the best!

4. Food here is good. Yum, yum!

D Day - relocation!

I gotta say this upfront : God is great! I am so blessed!

The last 2 weeks were difficult. I knew it was going to be rough... selling my car, getting my paperwork done, finishing up work, transitioning work to CK, trying to meet up with everyone and eating farewell meals...

I now know who really loves me enough to cry... *sob* Some of the farewell meals ended up in a teary mess.

God is great, I have such wonderful friends, esp the 'hardcores'. Life is gonna be rough without you guys.

Exercise routine while traveling...

We all know how it is while on the road. You mean to get up earlier to go to the hotel gym or hotel pool.. but what if there is no gym or pool. Perhaps others do floor exercises.

Here's what hard cores do...

Taipei Preview Trip

As part of the relocation, I get to spend 5 nights in Taipei.

I spent 3 days viewing apartments, relaxing in my room, dropping by to say hello to my new NB teammates, eating lunch with my current CPC folks...

Then when Ms Hardcore came by Fri nite to Sun afternoon - we played hard! Of cos la, we're talking abt Ms Hardcore, duh! http://www.flickr.com/photos/8062670@N07/sets/72157600736728232/

Or Ms Hardcore's pix http://www.flickr.com/photos/ziinger/sets/72157600724024616/

At the end of the week, I possibly may have an apartment, I brought back my new work NB to setup, and I am mentally prepared/relaxed for the new challenge. Pix of the studio apartment I hope to get... (Steph.. see, not bad eh?)



Bring Taipei on!

Taipei is very Chinese...

Today is a day of discovery!

1. Taipei is very very Chinese.

2. 牛腩麵 is NOT the same as 牛肉麵. I ate brisket for the 1st time in my life - squishy tendons I don't like.


3. Taiwanese measure apartments in 坪. 12坪 studio apartments are too small for me to consider a home. Actually smaller than my hotel room - which I tot was small already.

4. 鼎泰豐is really yummier here than in Singapore. No wonder there was a queue for it, and there was still a queue after we left.

5. Aftermath of kiling myself on Sok Bee's grey route on wall 3 of Yishun - my shoulders & upper arms ache and I got 3 finger joints that hurt. Thank God I have a massage appointment when I return - thanks to Derek!

Opps I did it again...

Forgot to bring running shorts...

Realised while changing in toilet. Yz screamed so loudly in frustration that I think some folks in China walking up the Great Wall stumbled - ok so yeah, 2nd time I forgot *sheepish*

Had to run a long distance wif Ms Hardcore and buy her Haato at the end of the run to appease her.

Now my legs are sore and my waist bigger... Sigh...

Working late - for the LAST TIME for consumer PC team!

My last show with my current team. Getting Neptune ready for show&tell was a lot of work! It was so raw - looks like handbuilt by R&D guys in the US. We had missing drives, wrong drivers, missing DMI, the HD-DVD drive came separate...
Of cos being the last minute cocky idiots who never learn, we waited til end Monday to freak out.

Running around in panic state, calling our Taiwan office, bugging our US folks who just flew in for the Summit (thank God for them).

By the time Terence & I packed up our 8 boxes - we were exhausted. Hey a PC weighs 15kg and a monitor about 12kg. Thankfully my new job is with notebooks - they are tiny relative to what I have to heave around today.

Tomorrow the summit starts & the product fair is Friday. Will be up late setting up, fixing and preparing my presentations... Sigh, gonna be a long next 2 days.

Cycling Pulau Ubin

We intended to go last Sunday but it rained... This Sat unfortunately my uncle flew off so he missed this trip. Sigh. He would've liked this.

We took some creaky rental bikes whose gears stick bad - uphills were painful (that's understating it). But seeing how I went with 2 sufferers of "hard-core-itis", I expected a true blue hardcore trip.

We biked hard (my forearms were so sore from grabbing my handlebars in fear as we tore down steep hills that the next day I couldn't cut my passport photos for my Taiwan work permit)...

We climbed hard - eh? Mountain biking where got climbing, not salah, we cycled to a quarry, stashed bikes behind bushes, and dive off the cliffs only to climb back up. Called deep water soloing where if you fall, you crash back into the water. Derek took videos which were a blast. While uploading to YouTube I kept laughing out loud to my monitor.

We teased and laughed at one another... It was very memorable. I will so miss these 2 hardcore sufferers so much *sob*

Mileage

It's been years since I last used the term 'mileage' ;) shows how lazy I've been.

It was a half-marathon mileage over 3 days.

Mon - 5k with Steph thru HP-Hyderabad Rd. Then we pigged out on Korean BBQ. Yummy...

Tue - 7k with Ms HardCore. Then we climbed.

Thu - 9k with Joanne, Derek and Ms HardCore. Then we suppered on yi-mee cooked with a mountain of lard. Gross!

Hot chick

While showing me his photos on Flickr, Terence saw mine and tot Joanne was a babe...

She was thrilled all nite after I told her...

But the woman still cannot differentiate between Prana & Prada!

So Joanne, this is

PRANA (the cool brand we climbers wear)

The very cool climbing top & pants we bought you for your birthday? Prana!

Prada is the brand of our shoes, handbags, wallets (not including those of us with the Prada accessories from KL's Chinatown.. tsk tsk!)

Absent-mindedness

Some call it blur, I prefer to say absent-minded. Gives the illusion of a mind distracted.. instead of just not having it all together ;)

First I tot I lost my HP access badge. That would've cost me $50 replacement fee. My friends were so nice, they all panic-ed and offered me helpful advice. Ultimate was a colleague who asked me to tell them that I dropped it into toilet, before I flushed...

Found it subsequently after freaking out 1 day in the laundry basket. Blur me dumped both dirty clothes + badge in there.

Next I packed 2 running jerseys and no shorts to go for an evening jog. It gave me an excuse to not have to run with Yingzi (Ms Hard-Core wanted to do laps up and down Mount Faber)... Or I could run in my underwear. No flashing in the Telok Blangah area - Yingzi offered me her running shorts and jogged in surfing bermuda - she looked like some sufer chick all nite.

Last nite, I left my pink and very beautiful Nalgene bottle behind at the coffeeshop after supper. I spent all nite thinking how much i loved it and how some lucky bastard will never treat it as well as I would... *sob* Thanks to God for good friends, Yingzi (again!) picked it up after me and had put it in my car for me.

Conclusion

1. I need to get my act together!

2. God is good! I have good friends!

3. How will I survive Taipei alone?! *wail*

My body hurts...

Ever since the decision to move to Taipei end July, I've been punishing myself...

Cycle - Vesak Day
Last Thu was a public holiday and I went with Yz, Derek, my 50+ uncle in a small band of 9 gung-ho weekend warrior friends to cycle Penggarang. Intended as my farewell ride - selling my Trek to You Chien - my cousin afterwards. I cycled off fast and knew Yz would follow. She did more, she overtook me. The return was crazier : Yz, Kenny & I drafted each other, pushing one another on. It was absolutely crazy the speeds we were doing despite the strong headwinds. Often cruising 28-30km with the strong headwind.

Of cos we pigged out big time on lobsters and crabs and too much food in general. BURP!

Climb - last weekend
2 days later, over the weekend, we drove up to KL to climb at Camp 5. Yz borrowed her brother's BMW, so we went up in style. We chose to stay close to the climbing gym, in Royale Bintang at the nearby The Curve. Hotel was new and way nicer than KL Plaza Suites. The best part, we found out we could walk back after climbing to our hotel room. Need to trek 15mins thru the mall's carpark, by golf driving range, then voila, hotel!

This is me, during and after...

The next day we chilled, Melvin & family went swimming while the rest of us ventured out to shop around at the Curve. Then stroke of luck, Derek's wife found a spa. Amazingly they had slots for all of us - the Urban Retreat was simply fantastic! I will gush again, their Thai masseurs could work magic, absolutely fanastic!

Thursday 7 Jun

Yz proposed this zany plan. We leave work early for a triathlon of sorts : jog 5k, swim 20 laps and then climb 5 climbs. I was on course and couldn't leave til 5pm, so we dropped the swim. The jog went ok, until the last 800m or so when Derek broke away on a sprint. Tried to chase the man (he claims the last run he did was during reservist 5yrs ago!) but he was way too fast!

Then we climbed.

Now I am sore... and Yz sadly hurt her shoulder badly doing a tough climb. Praying Yz for a speedy recovery, may God heal your shoulder!

Taiwan - here I come!

I took the job. Timing was perfect.

Got 2 months to close up everything & pack. Woo...

Decision Time

After some weeks of furious interviewing..

Let's see, I went for,
- numerous rounds (i forget) for WW Product Manager - Entry Level Home PC. Based in Taiwan reporting into Cupertino. I started interviewing in Oct 2006.
- WW Product Manager - Notebooks. Based in Taiwan reporting into Houston. I started interviewing last month.
- Citrix. 1 round. Last week. Came almost immediately after I parked my CV on Monster.com.
- Microsoft, for Product Manager for XBox. Just initial screener call. Same week as Citrix.
- EMC, for Product Manager. Just initial screener call. Early this week

Was offered the WW Product Manager - Notebook role yesterday.

Decision time!

The song I have on repeat play

It came up during dinner after one of those climbing sessions. Melvin sang a little of a Hokkien Christian song that had everyone in stitches. He was surprised none of us had heard of Hokkien Christian songs that he cut us a CD with 2 Hokkien songs on it. Ironically, I liked the song in between the 2 Hokkien songs. So did the other gals... Now we hum it all the time...

He Never Sleeps - Don Moen

When you've prayed every prayer that you know how to pray.
Just remember the Lord will hear and the answer is on it's way.
Our God is able.
He is mighty.
He is faithful.
And He never sleeps, He never slumbers.
He never tires of hearing our prayer.
When we are weak He becomes stronger.
So rest in His love and cast all of your cares on Him.

Do you feel that the Lord has forgotten your need.
Just remember that God is always working in ways you cannot see.
Our God is able.
He is mighty.
He is faithful.

1st Dive Trip 2007

Went diving over weekend with YeanYean and her friends.

It was great cos I had a brief respite from the chilly atmosphere at home and also I didn't have to pretend over Mother's Day.

We went to Tioman. Was organised by a friend of Yean's, so it was overall cheaper and we also slept on terra cotta, albeit a sleezy, yicky budget hotel in Mersing. But beats sleeping on a rocking boat.

Mostly seasoned divers with cameras so the diving was leisurely and they were great at spotting macro stuff. After a while though, I was bored of drift diving and staring at yet another nudibranch. Tioman is still good diving despite the sheer no. of divers there.

The highlight was the 2nd day when Irene spotted a shark in a cave, when I finned over, there were 3 guys lying on the seabed staring into a cave. As I approached, Irene signalled shark, I squeezed beside the guys and stared into nothing - just blackness. Then I saw a fin, it was big, then the side of a shark, then the whole shark appeared maybe 10cm in front of my face - so close I saw razor sharp teeth! The nurse shark is at least 5 feet. TS said it was trying to escape from us, but I think it was trying to remind us that it's a shark, with teeth fully capable of eating one of us! Anyways, I screamed so loud that everyone was laughing at me once safely up on the boat.

Great weekend!

Cycling Mandai Road

I've been meaning to cycle Mandai but somehow, fear of being roadkill on Singapore roads and also I guess just never gotten round to it.

Until Yingzi suggested cycling to Yishun to climb instead of driving there.

Since I've been binging on seafood twice that week, decided it may be time to work off my butts.

We met along 6th Avenue and started down through the length of Bukit Timah, then into Mandai Road. It only got less scary after Mandai when the no. of cars pettered out. But then the rolling hills started. *Groan*

But it was fun! It took us slightly over 1 hour to do the 30km ride. So quite proud of myself. It helped that Yingzi took off at a crazy pace along Mandai and I had to chase her down.

Amazingly after a short rest and 1 bottle of 100-Plus, we could still climb!

May

Wow, time does zip by. It's 1 May and we get a day off. Had a long list of todos, but only managed,
- wake up to climb (vain attempt to work off the lobster from Derek's birthday dinner last nite)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8062670@N07/

- ate midday meal at 3pm

- afternoon nap to make up for the lack of sleep from sharing a room with mom last weekend

- watch 300 on DVD (it is so violent!)

So much for the evening jog or washing my filthy car (poor baby). Will wait for rest of week!

Holy Saturday

I'm toying with 2 changes :
1. find a new job
- with recent people changes, the team is now more political than ever. Plus they backstab!
- I've been here 3 years, it is about time to move on.

2. move out
- I really find it really hard to stay with my mom. Perhaps it is cowardice, but perhaps with some space, we can find a more amicable relationship.
- And I am 37 years old this year, I think I have a right to my own place right?
- However, I'm not sure if this decision makes her happier than I'm not there to fight with or would it be viewed as not caring for her anymore...

Been praying about these decisions for the last week.

Stop the world! I wanna get off!!

Ever had one of those times when everything possible goes wrong?

I've pretty much painted myself into a corner... I'm tired, fedup of being attacked and depressed.

To the baying hungry wolves howling for my blood, I wish you a blessing from Numbers 6:22-27.

May the Lord bless you, and keep you ; The Lord make His face shine on you, And be gracious to you ; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, And give you peace. So they shall invoke My name on the sons of Israel, and I shall bless them.